4 ms·

What Patrick said. In the U.S., there has to be at least minimal originality to be able to claim copyright. The White Pages don't count (sayeth the Supreme Cour

by dctoedt 15y ago

What Patrick said. In the U.S., there has to be at least minimal originality to be able to claim copyright. The White Pages don't count (sayeth the Supreme Court of the U.S.). Neither do exact photographic reproductions of paintings (sayeth another federal court). Even now, 25 years after Pam Samuelson's [1] seminal article [2], it's still unclear whether computer-generated works can be subject to copyright protection. [1] http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~pam/ http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~pam/ [2] http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~pam/papers/47UPittLRev1185.pdf http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~pam/papers/47UPittLRev11...

rmc 15y ago
Raw facts don't count as copyrightable, but a collection/database can count as copyrightable in some cases. This is how map data is copyrightable. Each individual road data ("The road is called main street", "Main St. is 200m long", "The top corner of main street is at X deg North, Y deg West", etc.) is just a little fact, and itself is not copyrightable. However if you collect all those uncopyrightable facts together into one database/collection, then that database/collection might be a copyrightable work. Tracing street/road positions from aerial imagery may or may not be making a derived work. It may or may not be similar to your 'photograph of a paining'. This sort of thing is important for OpenStreetMap and tracing from aerial imagery. However in that project, we avoid legal gray areas and just don't trace from aerial imagery without permission. But when it comes to copyrights, IANAL, lots of this is decided by case law in courts, it varies from country to country, and you should get a lawyer if you need better answers.
- dctoedt 15y ago
  > However if you collect all those uncopyrightable facts together into one database/collection, then that database/collection might be a copyrightable work. True, if there is at least a modicum of "originality" in the selection and/or arrangement of the uncopyrightable facts. In the U.S. Supreme Court's Feist case,[1] the Court held that an alphabetical arrangement of names, etc., in the white pages of a phone directory did not include the requisite originality. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural

by dctoedt 15y ago

rmc 15y ago

Raw facts don't count as copyrightable, but a collection/database can count as copyrightable in some cases. This is how map data is copyrightable. Each individual road data ("The road is called main street", "Main St. is 200m long", "The top corner of main street is at X deg North, Y deg West", etc.) is just a little fact, and itself is not copyrightable. However if you collect all those uncopyrightable facts together into one database/collection, then that database/collection might be a copyrightable work. Tracing street/road positions from aerial imagery may or may not be making a derived work. It may or may not be similar to your 'photograph of a paining'. This sort of thing is important for OpenStreetMap and tracing from aerial imagery. However in that project, we avoid legal gray areas and just don't trace from aerial imagery without permission. But when it comes to copyrights, IANAL, lots of this is decided by case law in courts, it varies from country to country, and you should get a lawyer if you need better answers.

dctoedt 15y ago
> However if you collect all those uncopyrightable facts together into one database/collection, then that database/collection might be a copyrightable work. True, if there is at least a modicum of "originality" in the selection and/or arrangement of the uncopyrightable facts. In the U.S. Supreme Court's Feist case,[1] the Court held that an alphabetical arrangement of names, etc., in the white pages of a phone directory did not include the requisite originality. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feist_v._Rural